Ananth Padmanabhan has been appointed chief executive officer of HarperCollins India, reporting to Charlie Redmayne. Padmanabhan has been svp, sales at Penguin Random House in India. He starts at the beginning of October, after current ceo P.M. Sukumar steps aside. The company also announced the formation of a new HarperCollins India Board, which will include Redmayne, Padmanabhan, managing director of Collins Learning Colin Hughes, finance director of Harper UK Ed Kielbasiewicz, finance director of Harper India Amit Abrol, HC UK corporate development director Alex Beecroft, and managing director of Collins India Krisha Naroor.
Redmayne said in the announcement: “I am delighted that Ananth is joining as ceo of HarperCollins India at this important time. He is an experienced publishing executive with a clear strategic mind and commercial acumen, which he combines with the energy needed to build on the brilliant work already done by our team in India. It is a time of real opportunity for HarperCollins India and I know that Ananth will do a terrific job in helping us grasp it firmly.” Padmanabhan added: “It is a great privilege to have been offered this opportunity, at a time of such rapid change in the Indian publishing industry. HarperCollins is a company I have long admired; for the breadth of its publishing and, in Collins, its fast growing education business. HarperCollins has one of the most experienced and dynamic teams in publishing and I am greatly looking forward to working with them.”
At Penguin Random House in India, Nandan Jha has been promoted to vp, product and sales.
Emily Angell has joined Thomas Dunne Books as an editor. Previously she was an editor at Portfolio/Current/Sentinel.
At Simon Pulse, Michael Strother has been promoted to editor.
At Ankerwycke Books, Jon Malysiak has been promoted to director.
At Thomas Nelson, LeeEric Fesko has been promoted to associate publisher, special imprints (which include the Lucado brand, and Leadership Network: NEXT).
Kate Gales Schafer will join William Morrow as publicity manager on August 31. Previously she was a senior publicist at Simon & Schuster.
Alisa Plant will join the University of Nebraska Press as editor-in-chief on September 14. Previously she was senior acquisitions editor at Louisiana State University Press.
Awards
The Thurber Prize has announced its shortlist, with the winner to be named on September 28:
Roz Chast, Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant? (Bloomsbury)
Annabelle Gurwitch, I See You Made An Effort: Compliments, Indignities, and Survival Stories from the Edge of 50 (Blue Rider Press)
Julie Schumacher, Dear Committee Members (Doubleday)
This year the National Book Foundation will work “exclusively” with The New Yorker to announce the four National Book Awards longlists — on consecutive days, starting September 14 with the young people’s literature list. Actual finalists will be named October 14 (opening day of the Frankfurt Book Fair).